don't eat old food nor talk to people while they are using the restroom.

Just yesterday i ate some of the food that Cassie gave me back in South Carolina. I cooked me some ramen and added the meat to it with a little bit of water left in it. It was a week and a half old. i didn't get sick. but i didn't feel too great after i ate it. belly pangs.

the room that smelt like womanly armpit. i might have a video at the bottom.

this guy took a pic of me. Jack spires i think. he said, "get right with Jesus and everything works out."

The weather changed in my time in Asheville. It got coooolllldd. It seems like it's staying. I was sleeping in my car and waking up to 45-52degree temps in my car. The rain ceased and Asheville and it's glory was revealed. mountains all around.

i learned from the best to take photos incorporating the sun. =P

I ended up going back to finish my trip up to Mt. Mitchell. the highest point in NC and the highest point east of the Mississippi river.

i guess a song just ended

Friday night was the night of the well known drum circle in Asheville. ooooh. i dug it. hundreds of people gathered in this little park to watch about 20 or so people banging on drums and other percussion instruments in a fancy fashion. many locals and many tourists. many people standing on the sidelines enjoying the drummers and the dancers in the middle. Some people get the guts enough to go down where the dancing is and just get a little bit closer. Some start wiggling a little bit. Even some people wiggle a lot. it's a blend participants and spectators. i filled every role at one point except that of the drummer. i didn't have a drum. even if i did have a drum, i've never been good at drumming. sometimes i walked around and saw the hula hoopers working for cash. further away from the action were some nice hippie looking folk holding small signs with scriptures on them. i enjoyed the dialogs with them as well. i asked to take their picture, cuz it was really neat looking but the girl said that i wasn't allowed. There was a rule behind thier faith that didn't allow u to take their pictures. i shoulda been sneaky and put my zoom lens on and went across the street when they weren't looking. but nah. that's not nice. i talked to the most talkative guy from their 3 man army. after talking to men like this... i don't think i was ever really a christian in the first place. everyone has their stipulations that makes them more qualified to experience the Lord. but that's ok. they are all justifiable using the bible. how convenient.

drum circle madness

a bad night pic of the hula hooper.

a wiggler in the drum circle

wild and crazy women

This night i worked my magic and met two lovely ladies on a weekend trip from PENNSYLVANIA! What the... they were both wiggling and shaking down at the bottom of the drum circle. i ended up chit chatting with them at 10 when the circle ended. we went and had some drinks at the local bar where there was some jiving music. one was amish and was on her final year of her "free period". she had 3 kids. she was also a barrel racer. the other was 35 and retired. i can't remember what other lies they told me. =) but the truth ended up coming out... i think. maybe. anyway, i got in touch with them the following morning at an art festival and we hung out the rest of the day. took a hike. went to eat at a place called 12 Bones (?) Barbeque. When we got there it was closed. what kind of restaurant isn't open on saturday or sunday? so we ended up leaving and eating elsewhere. i ate some fancy grub. a plethora of flavors hit my taste buds that night. these young ladies were kind enough to let me shower in their hotel room. later that night they were nice enough to let me sleep on the floor of the room. it was going to get really cold that night in Asheville. they might have saved my life. =) maybe. Katie and Jesse. if i make it up to pennsylvania...i'll go give them high fives! they actually might move to asheville they liked it so much. in which case i'll never see them again!

Jesse, the retired drummer

Katie the Amish Mother of 3

I stayed in asheville one more night. due to the rain on my way up to asheville, all my junk on my roof got wet. i have a weatherproof roof bag up there. whatever that means. i guess rain isn't part of the weather that it is proofed from. it must be weather proofed during beautiful weather. it must keep the yummy sun rays out or something. all my warm winter clothes were damp and stinky so i went and washed them at a laundry mat and then bagged everything up there in trash bags. none of this is interesting to u. u are saying.. where's the action? we want action! WE DEMAND IT!. =) suckers.  u aint gonna get it.

SIDE NOTE:. as i'm typing my blog. i have facebook on in the background. i got a note from Ruffio. the guy i picked up in Florida. He never found his pops. our final two leads turned up zilch he said. in fact, he fell asleep drunk one night in public and he was taken to jail for 2 weeks.  =( he got a ride out from GA and is now heading towards Tennessee to meet up with an old friend. oh well. =/  can't do anything.

the following morning i had an oil change before i headed out towards Tennessee to meet a friend of a friend from California living in Knoxville. before i left i wanted to see if i could talk to one of the folks living in their car.

If there was ever a worst time to go talk to a guy living out of his car, i chose that time. As i walked over to the faded maroon 4 door Lincoln, i can't recall excactly which kind of car it was....i said howdy.
"don't come over here, i'm taking care of some business" came sternly to me. i immediately knew what that meant by the brief image i saw out of the corner of my eye. it meant he was pissing. pissing in a bottle. sometimes u have to do it when u don't want to walk the distance or when it's not night time to pee in the brush.  damn. i felt horrible. but whatever.
the mans name was patrick. and his life has been jacked up by his wife. I like to listen to stories like this, but there is always a side of the story from his wife that i will never get to hear. i told him my little story.. real briefly i mentioned something about leaving faith. he said, "u messed there boy".  =)
he went on to tell me one of his stories. one day he was over dosing on a lot of tylenol. depressed from his divorce with his wife and he had a visitation from an angel of God. the angel showed him two pictures.. one of his dead family members and one of some little monsters. He told me cats eat grass in heaven. This man patrick was very coherent. he was dead serious. The way i say it makes it sound kind of silly. but he was extremely sincere. he said, i know it sounds hard to believe, but i know what i saw.

I left and headed towards tennessee.

The mountains before me. The mountains around me. The mountains behind me. I went thru the smokey mountains only to hit knoxville tennessee which had no more mountains. i got kinda sad. it was like a good friend and i had just departed ways. Though the mountains didn't talk much. they brought a lot of pleasant experiences to my soul. i tried talking to them. i tried singing about them. i like those mountains.

i got to knoxville in time to write some blog before amanda my connection was free from work. well. she was already off of work, so i didn't write anything. i just got ready to meet her by sitting on my butt.
we walked around the downtown knoxville in under 20 min and saw all the things that make knoxville knoxville. then we went into some fancy coffee shop. i just had coffee at starbucks.. so i got a tea. i don't drink tea. but this came on some fancy tray with some fancy pitcher that i had to push down on the lever to squeeze out my tea. it didn't work so the lady gave me a different type of device i had never seen. that one worked. my tea was great. My company was way better. Amanda is going to New York to study law. we had pleasant conversations about life. then we went to a bar to eat some pizza and drink some beer. She is a beer connoisseur. i didn't know how to spell that, so i cut and pasted it from the web. she knows her beers and was patient with my lack of knowledge of good beer. mmmmm. i tasted some yummy beer. but i only remember the apple cider. there was another with pecan that was yummy and another one with blueberry. ufda! yum. we listened to some good tunes from a male duet and then went to Preservation Pub to hear some even more amazing music from the traveling trabadors (?)/ carolina something. it was 3 girls and 2 guys. some amazing tunes with some amazing harmonies.
we ended up leaving and couldn't find amandas car. but we did find some meat. =)

my first view in the city

bye bye mountains

me and my bag of life

my TN friend Amanda

where's the car?

no car, but here's some meat.

i find myself in a mcdonalds with free wi fi. there were some travelers here. train hoppers to be exact. one of the guys said some stupid stuff that i over heard partially. something like, "that fuck up. i pulled out my gun and pistol whipped his ass. knocked him down and then i pissed on his face."  gosh. that didn't sound like too pleasant of a scenario. whatever.
i'm gonna leave.

I left. and i'm at another mcdonalds on wednesday finishing up this blog. A homeless guy just left me named Darren. it was brief, but i bought him some grub and talked a little bit. u never know whose stories are true. but this guy, who didn't look homeless...was trying to quit drinking cuz it's ruining his life and he wants to be happy. that's the power to change.. being fed up! that and maybe jesus? nah. just being fed up and maybe a group like the church or an AA meeting.  but he split.

another story and i should be all caught up with my adventures! bloggin sucks butt and stinks worse than i do. i need a shower.
yesterday i was inspired to go get inspired to write a song. so i found a park. it was the harriet tubman park. my inspiration didn't work. i played guitar and fell asleep on the grass, in the shade. and got really cold. =) i left after a short nap. and on the way out as i was going down MLK st. and there was a car run into a curb blocking one of my lanes. it wasn't wrecked or nothing and i could see a woman running like a chicken. i drove up and asked if she needed help. she said sure. i pulled over.. she was right next to a gas station that she didn't make it to.  anyhow, she grabbed a gallon milk jug and filled it with gas hoping that would work. i waited at her car looking like the owner of the car while she got gas. people were looking at me like, "um...what are u doing?".....2 people came to aid me to push the car when the lady came back. the gas didn't work so we started pushing. backwards up the slope and then let it roll down into the gas station. a young man and a girl assisted in the push. she got gas and left. i sat in the parking lot listening to Skip Heitzig talk about the last days on the radio for about 10 minutes. in my rear view mirror, i could see the young man that helped push the car and his girl carrying a baby bed. the young girl was pregnant. no way jose am i gonna let a woman carry a bed on her back. now my car is a house and is packed but i offered to load them up and carry them to their house. i cleaned off the front seat for the girl and the guy threw the bed in the back and laid on top of the matress. they invited me up their goverment housing. it was one of those big brick buildings. 4 stories tall. there was 3 buidlings all the same with a court yard in the middle. i didn't realize this was the ghetto. because of their income these folks pay $25 a month. the mans name was drew, 24 years old this year. the girl was 21 year old Brenda, pregnant with her fourth, drews first with her. drew has 2 other kids. the room they lived on was the 4th floor. actually they were five floors. my bad. as i said, this was the ghetto. the room was a one room unit. much like an efficiency. one room connected to a bathroom and a kitchen. he was a christian. he's lived on the streets for a year. he's got a tough life. real tough. both of them.
i was thinking about my fears just walking through this ghetto area. they told me this was the 3rd worst projects in knoxville. shootings and junk used to be more prevalent. they said it was real loud at night.. the whole court yard filled with people. fighting and stuff happens. i walked by some of the folks that made it scary.

have u ever walked through the ghetto? are u fearful? do u look straight ahead and avoid eye contact with the black man with the baggy pants. avoid the group of young men sitting outside? do u feel like u are a target cuz of ur nice clothes? do u know that there are children, and grandparents, and mothers, sons and daughters that must walk through steps like these everyday, steps far away from us. far away from where we will rarely ever have to walk through. far away from where we will ever even want to go. they live there. i wonder if they fear the way i felt. the fear wasn't overwhelming. it would've been if i wasn't walking with drew. by the time i left his house it was night time and i saw many more of the fellow humans that brought that sinking feeling to me. may my mind and heart change concerning places like this.
i have a writing more detailed than this that i wrote earlier. i think it sounded better.. but kind of the same idea behind it.
anyhow. we ate some yummy sloppy joes and and me and drew played guitar for one another. he was asking why i wasn't on the radio playing my bible songs. he said "u know u're in the bible belt don't u, you could be making money and get on the air in this area." ha! anyhow. i got to leaving and i asked if i could take a picture of them. Brenda immediately said yes, but drew hates pictures like a whole lot. i have never heard such adamant remarks to avoid a photo. he thinks it ruins the memory. whatever. i gave them hugs and left.

the time is 5:55pm. mcdonalds knoxville TN.